Feast of St. Irenaeus*.
As the nation worried last week about oil spill, Iran, immigration and deficits, leaders of The Squid who control Chicago, Illinois and now national government, were engrossed in something else that has first priority.
It has to do with 2011. That’s the year the senior partner of The Squid, Mayor Richard M. Daley, is to run for reelection. This takes precedence over anything and everything else.
How Defeating a Local Prosecutor Elected Kennedy.
Those who believe The Squid thinks of national elections before its own Chicago ones are sadly mistaken. There is still extant the myth that in 1960 Richie’s father, Richard J., masterminded massive vote fraud in order to elect John F. Kennedy over Richard Nixon on the sentimental pretext that Kennedy like Daley was Irish Catholic and Daley wanted to help elect the first Catholic president in U.S. history.
No way.
Richard I was not in the slightest sentimental over a future Catholic president but was a cold-eyed politician concerned about himself solely. The old man masterminded massive vote fraud not to elect Kennedy but to defeat a long forgotten Republican states attorney named Ben Adamowski(the county’s prosecutor) who was out to convict Squid crooks. Earlier, ex-Democrat Adamowski closed down illegal gambling dens, gained convictions in the circuit courts and the Summerdale police scandal where cops were conspiring to burgle dozens of North Side retail establishments. He needed one more term as prosecutor and then…as a popular Pole from the Northwest Side…he’d run against Daley himself for mayor.
This threat was regarded by the then Squid with the same urgency as the Great Fire of 1871. The presidency was ignored.
To rid themselves of Adamowski, Daley’s Squid hustled every available illegal vote by rustling up ghost voting and fraudulent multi-voting by the Syndicate-controlled “River Wards.” As one who headed an independent anti-vote fraud organization in the `70s, I heard the stories of the infamous `60 election. I remember Bernie Carey who was running as a Republican in the `70s tell me he made a nocturnal visit to a storefront polling place before it’s opening at 6 p.m. The store’s lights were on and Dem precinct captains were working the voting machines. The way the machines were run in those days was that you stepped inside the booth, pulled the lever and the curtains rang closed to ensure voter privacy. As Bernie watched outside the storefront, the voting booth curtains were opening and shutting with rapidity as Dem precinct captains were ringing up false totals before the polls opened.
To be Adamowski, drunks were rounded up in trucks and delivered to the polls, each receiving a chicken for food or a bottle of whiskey for sustenance as thanks for voting straight Democratic. The dead arose from their graves as if it were Resurrection Day and the last trumpet had sounded, voting the straight Democratic ticket. Precinct captains stood by as the curtains closed and timed how long the bums and derelicts stayed inside.
Hired voters were expected to stay in the voting booths no longer than 3 minutes, enough to pull the lever on the voting machine for the straight Dem ticket. Any dilly-dallying meant they were inside the booth picking and choosing which was unacceptable. Meaning they wouldn’t ge4t a chicken or a bottle of booze. In addition in the River Wards election officials got to the polling places before they opened and rang up a good number of tallies, the curtains on the booths flying open and closing.
Ben Adamowski the honest prosecutor was defeated by 26,000 votes.. The undertow enabled JFK to carry Illinois by fewer than 9,000 out of 4.75 million cast. Kennedy heaved a great sigh of relief and blessed Daley for his help. Naïve historians including the late Teddy White have since recorded that Daley motivated by Irish ethnic pride, Catholic solidarity and/or love of the Democratic party came through for his young compatriot.
Hah!
Every Chicagoan alive and politically aware then knew Daley did it for his own survival. He could have taken Dick Nixon for president…or even Bugs Bunny…but not another term of Ben Adamowski as prosecutor—else many would go to jail. .
Now once again, while other Dems are thinking how they can keep the Congress Democratic after 2010 and how they can reelect Obama, The Chicago Squid is concentrating exclusively on itself and Richard II’s reelection. There is no doubt that the pro-abort, pro-gay rights mayor, age 68 is going to run for a 7th term. He dearly loves his wife Maggie who’s a cancer victim and tears up whenever he mentions her but…
…he’ll run whether she’s alive or dead—unless his own health is so precarious as to be nearly terminal—which doesn’t seem likely. His Squid co-pilot, Irish Catholic House Speaker Mike Madigan who’s also 68 (and a pro-lifer by convenience since he represents a conservative blue-collar pro-life district) prays for the day when his pro-abort, pro-gay rights stepdaughter Attorney General Lisa Madigan runs for governor—so he wants to remain politically viable…which means staying as Speaker and state Democratic chairman at least until she’s elected. Staying in politics is also good for his multi-million-dollar net worth as he runs a law firm that gets reductions in personal property taxes for big businesses—dependent on his remaining close to the chairman of the Cook county Board of (Tax) Appeals who is also the Cook county Dem chairman.
The accommodative Catholic chancery, of course, continues to be mum about the Democratic party’s near top-to-bottom support of abortion and gay rights. It’s not brought up: a no-no.
Daley and Madigan aren’t close but nevertheless both are bound together like two men in a lifeboat on the high seas. Actually one is so voluble he’s gabby goofy (Daley) and the other is laconic and terse as Gary Cooper (Madigan) but in cold-blooded politics they’re like twin peas in a pod. Neither has thought of retiring. Retiring from politics is like going to Kenny Brothers funeral parlor, hopping in coffins made by Trappist monks and allowing them to shut the lid and screw it tight. Retiring from politics is to them like retiring from life. .
A few years ago Madigan’s Democratic state government and toady governor changed the office of mayor to “non-partisan” which means that there will be no Republican challenger—just a straight runoff. It makes it easier for Daley to win in one fell swoop rather than be nominated by his party and run in the general. Last time he ran in 2007 he won by 70%. 70%.
The dates for reelection are drawing near. The first day to circulate petitions is Sept. 15 of this year. . Deadline for filing the petitions isDec. 13. Election is Feb. 22, 2011—Washington’s birthday. Term of office starts with the swearing-in, May 4, 2011.
If perchance Daley doesn’t run (because of terminal illness or death), other names mentioned are: Rahm Emanuel , Obama’s pencil-thin, eclectic, pro-abort, pro-gay rights, potty-mouthed, quirky, Jewish chief-of-staff who is wearing on Obama’s nerves and would soon get on Chicago’s…pro-abort, pro-gay rights Catholic Cong. Luis (Little Looie) Gutierrez the most radical Lefty in the Squid who is too emotionally mercurial to be effective who has egotistically all but announced leadership of Hispanics…city clerk Catholic pro-abort, pro-gay rights Miguel del Valle a less stentorian, lower key rival to Gutierrez for Hispanic leadership…and pro-abort, pro-gay rights Catholic States Attorney Anita Alverezho probably is the ablest and is certainly the most centrist and most diplomatic of the lot.
The Daley Record: Pro and Con.
Because the media, big business, labor unions and the Left are allied with him along with the supine Chicago media (with one notable exception), Daley has compiled a record of pros and cons. Last week the pro-Daley Crain’s Chicago Business wrote this shockingly candid assessment:
- What used to be Skid Row is a glittering façade of condo towers, businesses and restaurants; the population of the Near West and Near South Sides has tripled (mostly whites) and income has more than quadrupled.
- However parts of the city are seriously lagging and the city itself is hip-high in debt from the failed Olympics bid, Millennium park, expenses in slum removal for theatre districts—all because of massively under-funded city pensions and tax-increment financing subsidies handed out to city developers instead of what they were intended for—rehabbing poor neighborhoods.
- Bonded debt and long-term leases have risen much quicker than the city’s property tax base, amounting to $5,600 for each Chicagoan. The budget gap is serious, created by Daley’s drive to make the city amenable for young professionals and big corporations such as new arrivals: Boeing, UAL and Miller-Coors. He’s borrowed enormously for schools, parks and other agencies Daley controls.
- The nominal value of the city’s property-tax base since 1989 has risen faster than that of suburban Cook county: up 336% as compared to the suburbs’ 270%. This is not entirely bad for Daley because those who choose to remain are usually better healed and white, more inclined to vote for Daley and not fool around with racial stereotypical demagogues.
As result of the substantial black flight to the suburbs similar to white exodus in the `60s and `70s, Chicago is whiter and more middle-class, which helps the Irish who largely still control The Squid politically since growing minorities would be more inclined to press for the toppling of white leadership.
Unlike his father, Richard II does not face challenge from the
Left. I asked the ranking far-Left strategist in the nation who was on my ABC radio program last week if he was satisfied with Daley. “Yes, indeed,” said Bob Creamer. “He’s a very effective mayor.” Old Man Daley refused to accommodate the Left because he couldn’t stand them. Not so his son who has absorbed them into The Squid including unrepentant terrorist Billy Ayres and his wife Bernardine Dohrn.
Gangs, Murder the Most Serious Problems.
The most serious problem Daley has is the reputation of Chicago for violence, bloodshed, murders and mayhem which equates with and sometimes exceeds Baghdad.
Last weekend alone there were 10 dead and 60 wounded across the city largely through gangs. The shootings followed no pattern but the emergency rooms were frantically busy. The youngest victim was a 1-year-old girl wounded when shots rang out at a barbecue at 12:15 a.m. on the Near West Side. Questions like: what was a baby doing outside at that hour are not asked by either media or clergy. The churches including my own Catholic one have forsaken their role of encouraging marriage and family solidarity. Among the poor, family structure is almost non-existent as youth join Gangs that serve as substitute for non-families. Instead priests and ministers talk about “gun control,” and how bad the Nazi-like Arizona immigration law is.
Riding with the politically correct flow is Daley…along with his side-kick, the demagogic Catholic priest ally Fr. Michael Pfleger who received a top award from the archdiocese for “social justice.” Both he and Pfleger as well as the police superintendent make a big deal of collecting guns from the neighborhoods—but everyone knows the poor need guns to protect themselves from criminals. Forty-eight states have what is known as “conceal carry” where average people can acquire arms if they agree to firearms training. But the liberal community is hotly against this—and therefore so is Daley.
To liberals including the media, the cause of murder and violence are inanimate objects—guns, not the personal irresponsibility of gangs which pack them and shoot cowboy-style at will. Pentecostal and evangelical Protestant churches so popular with blacks including thundering, oracular, charismatic ministers emphasizing more civil rights, more subsidies and higher taxes to be paid by the rich, scarcely if ever touch on the most salient issue of all: family breakup. This includes the Catholic archdiocese which seems not to stress personal responsibility but just concentrate on the inanimate: guns ostensibly being fired by themselves, with no human personal responsibility. .
This despite the skyrocketing rate of black out-of-wedlock births stands at 72.3% ore than three times the rate that existed when Daniel Patrick Moynihan wrote his famous report in March, 1965 that identified Great Society government subsidies to women with children as responsible for driving fathers out of the family. White out-of-wedlock birth rate in 2008 was at 28.6%. When black illegitimacy was at that rate it alarmed Monyihan. Hispanics is at 52.5%according to the book Freedom is Not Enough [Basic Books, 2010] by James T. Patterson, professor emeritus at Brown University.
Churches Ignore Marriage Issue.
Why aren’t churches of all denominations stressing marriage and family responsibility and pointing up the connection between single-headed families by women and poverty, gang membership with their children and murder? It is seen as an insult to minorities to mention this fact. A preacher who does is berated as a racist, concentrating on onerous personal responsibility resting on the poor instead of hailing more government largesse. People tend to vacate such churches and contributions fall off.
Too, big media play the role of enablers. Editorial boards are too timid, politically correct or abjectly secular to stress marriage and family life. Politicians are indisposed to wage what may be seen as an indictment of an entire class. Daley shrewdly steers clear of the subject and sputters against the U. S. Supreme Court which seems poised to invalidate the Chicago gun ordinance as it did Washington, D. C. ‘s.
But the failure to stress marriage and family isn’t the main job of politicians or the police. It’s that of the churches. Churches could stress the need for adhering to the Judeo-Christian moral code and marriage rather than living together in herds but won’t. The reason is timidity and cowardice.
If there were an attempt to gather all the clergy…Protestant, Jewish and Catholic…form a Chicago Ministerial Society and join in a mass campaign to encourage marriage and legitimate births, there could be some advance. But timidity rules and nothing of significance is being done. The archdiocese points to certain strictures that are mentioned in pre-Cana conferences but there is nothing publicized on a vast scale by it or other churches that reach the minority public.
You see, it’s not politically palatable. And the Catholic archdiocese is nothing if not politically accommodating to The Squid.
That being the case, Daley’s worst problem will be shucked off in favor of more money for police and more “gun control.” Encouragement for marriage will not mentioned by either he, any candidate who may run against him or from the pulpits. It will be strictly treated as mum by the media and the churches including the Catholic archdiocese here. Instead churchmen seem to rail against any immigration restrictions such as Arizona’s as “Nazi-like” and rally for more subsidies from government.
Public Opinion Growing More Conservative.
While Daley and The Squid concentrate on reelection, Barack Obama’s strategists in Washington are scratching their heads about trends they can’t understand. Here less than two years ago, the country signaled what the Obama people thought was a sharp leftward turn in governance by electing a president who signified he would govern from the Left. They spent almost $800 billion in good old Keynesian, FDR style to win approval for forestalling a full-scale depression…and what has happened? Only 6% say the stimulus has provided jobs…according to a New York Times-CBS poll. .
They passed a universal health care law and 57% want it repealed. . Public opinion is moving against them on immigration, gun control, abortion, global warming and the role of government. Since the last presidential election, voters who consider the Dems too liberal have grown from 39% to 49% says Gallup. Stunningly, voters in swing districts believe “President Obama’s economic policies have run up a record federal deficit while failing to endthe recession or slow job losses,” by an alarming measure—57% to 37%.
Liberals can’t even count on Massachusetts to continue the Kennedy senate legacy: they elected Republican Scott Brown. New Jersey was supposed to be solid Squid territory: it elected a conservative Republican governor who told school teachers complaining about budget cuts to go find themselves other work if they don’t like the new austerity. Virginia has a new Republican governor.
Last week South Carolina moved closer to electing a conservative woman governor, an Indian American—the first woman to hold the office in the history of the state—who is a Sarah Palin clone…and indeed was endorsed by her. Nikki Haley announced she held her victory party in South Carolina’s Confederate Relic Room and Military Museum! A black conservative running for Congress defeated Strom Thurmond’s kid who was adjudged too wishy-washy!
So while The Chicago Squid concentrates on its destiny, the nation appears to be moving rightward. It won’t affect the Chicago Squid but it looks like after this November there won’t be a Speaker Nancy Pelosi or a Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid for that matter. And just maybe there’ll be an Irish Catholic pro-life Republican governor who will trim Mike Madigan’s sails.
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*: St. Irenaeus [203]. Bishop of Lyon, France and an important theologian whose significance has been fully recognized only in the 20th century. His principal works, only discovered in 1904, effectively refused the heresy of Gnosticism, stressing a clear reassertion of Catholic monotheism, emphasizing the identity of the God of the Old Testament with that of the New and the unity of the Father and Son in the work of revelation and redemption. Although all his other works have perished, the two works found in 1904 present a unified theory of theology that is as fresh today as when he wrote them. He died at Lyons and was buried in the crypt of the church of St. John until it was destroyed by Calvinists in 1562.
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